Requiem
by HeartOfChaos
Summary: The TARDIS forces the Doctor to go and say goodbye to an old friend.


_Not only is this the first story I've written in almost two years (haaaa about that…), this is my first Doctor Who story that I'm willing to publish for the lovely interwebs to read and pass judgment upon. This turned out a hell of a lot longer than I had intended. Woops. _

_But you know, I clearly own Doctor Who and everything to do with it, so your criticism means nothing to me! *sarcasm_

_Feedback is greatly appreciated and celebrated._

_Quick notes about the story: 11__th__ Doctor, after Amy and Rory died, but before all the Clara shenanigans. _

_Enjoy._

The TARDIS landed with a rather unceremonious thud behind a cluster of trees in a quaint neighborhood park, close to a quiet street lined with equally quiet and docile-looking houses. The doors opened of their own accord, and before he could realize what had happened, the Doctor had been flung out of his own ship and landed very ungracefully on his backside into particularly soggy patch of earth. He stood up, and as he tried to brush some of the muck off of his clothes, he glared at his temperamental little blue box in disdain.

"What was that for?!" he shouted. In response, the doors slammed shut.

"Oh, very mature. First you override my trip to Victorian England, then you shake me about like a—uh uh uhm—skittle on a rocket ship! Wait, I don't think that makes any…nevermind. Then you make a landing that make my worst one look as smooth as anything, propel me out, and lock the doors. What is your problem?!" he shouted. He banged his fist on the doors, begging to be let in. The doors did not give way. He pulled out his key and his sonic screwdriver, but to no avail; the doors remained sealed. After about fifteen minutes, he gave up. He plopped down on his backside, knees bent in front of him, and leaned back on his arms, outstretched behind him. He glared at his ship, which mutinously remained stationary and silent.

"What did you want me to see?" he asked quietly. "Can I get a hint? No, no, don't. I'm not in the mood for exploring. I am done with that life. No more fixing, no more helping, no more nothing!"

He sat there in silence for a few more minutes.

"Are you rebelling against this new decision?"

Silence. He swallowed down the large lump that frequented his throat nowadays, since Amy and Rory…

"Are you as angry with me as much as I am with myself? Is this you…rejecting me?" he whispered in trepidation.

The silence was different this time. He could feel the ship's energy shifting, practically hear the mind working. Then it picked itself up, hovered stationary about a few feet off the ground, and turned ninety degrees toward the left, so that the doors faced up the street. The Doctor peered up to the direction his ship indicated.

"I'm not going to investigate!" he cried. "I swore I was done poking my nose around in the business of others. Especially humans. I'm done saving them. In fact, I'm saving them by not doing any—"

The TARDIS thudded to the ground, still facing up the street to the left. The Doctor got the hint.

"…Alright, fine. Fine! But if anything goes wrong, if ANYONE, is harmed…I'm blaming you. I'm nothing but trouble."

And with that, he set off up the street, trying to look casual in his slightly-muddied tweed outfit. He felt like he had been here before…this sidewalk, this pavement felt very familiar to him…

When he came to a cross street about ten feet away, he realized why. This was Donna's old neighborhood. This was where she had lived with her mother and grandfather. But why…

He made his way to the house, mind whirring in curiosity and a sense of foreboding. Why had the TARDIS dropped him off here? She knew, more than anyone, that if she remembered anything, her mind would burn and she would…but maybe that was why she had parked around the corner behind trees, so he would get to see her before her mind had a chance to explode. She did not know this face, so that was a plus. And he had had her on his mind as of late. He had had all of his past companions on his mind, weighing in on each individual case, deciding whether or not he had done more harm than good by showing up and whisking them away from all they had ever known. He was still on the fence about his effects on Rose, Martha, Donna, Amy and Rory. On the one hand, they had all become stronger people afterwards. On the other…he had been responsible for them, and they had gotten injured under his care, or worse…Amy…

He swallowed and pushed his guilt and self-loathing to the back of his mind: he could dwell on this once he was back inside his hopefully satisfied and welcoming ship. He found himself in front of Donna's old home. There was Donna's mother's old car, still sitting in the drive. It looked like it hadn't moved in a long while. He hesitated: what was he going to say? It's not like Wilf, if the poor old man were in fact still alive, nor Donna's mother, would recognize him. What were they going to say to him if he asked about Donna, a married woman?

He took a breath and decided to do what he did best: wing it. He strode over to the door, extended his arm to knock when another wave of hesitation gripped him. What was he doing?

The door opened before he could make another move, and there stood Wilf. He looked a good deal older than when last they had met: the wrinkles were deeper, the dark circles under his eyes more pronounced. His hair was still hanging in there, but not by much. His posture was more stooped, and the Doctor sensed that more than arthritis and osteoporosis were to blame for this.

The old man started at the site of the strange man on his stoop. He was leaving to go and ask the new neighbors if they wouldn't mind taking him to the pharmacy; his site was too bad to drive, his knees too sore to walk to the bus stop, and his granddaughter was in great pain and needed a refill on her medication. He had opened the door to find this young man with the oldest eyes on his step, arm outstretched as if he was about to knock.

"Can I help you?" Wilf asked.

The Doctor looked at him, contemplating whether or not to turn and run back to the TARDIS. Facing an irksome TARDIS suddenly seemed more appealing than what he felt would be an awkward and possibly unpleasant visit.

"Hello, Wilf, good man," he said, shifting awkwardly from foot to foot, not sure what else to say.

Wilf was confused. He may be well into his nineties, and he might occasionally forget the milk on the counter, but he was positive he had never seen this man before.

"I'm sorry, have we met?" he asked.

The Doctor tried to chuckle, but it came out something else. "Save the world with someone, and they can't remember you, even when you save their life in the process."

He let that sink in for a second, hoping this was enough of a hint. He did not want to explain his regeneration abilities at the moment.

Wilf stared at the man for a good ten seconds until realization donned on him.

"Doctor?!" he gasped, incredulous. "Is that really—But we thought you'd—your face, it's—where are your eyebrows?"

The last statement threw the Doctor off his guard. He could not help but smile and release a genuine burst of laughter. He hugged the old man fiercely but gently, and the hug was returned.

"Where are my manners, come in! I'll put the kettle on for some tea. If you wanna take a load off in the sitting room, I'll be back in a jiff. I've got to ask the neighbors to run me to store for Donna's medicine."

The Doctor stopped in midstep and turned around very slowly to face Wilf.

"Donna's ill?"

Wilf's face fell. He took a deep breath. "That's right, you wouldn't know…listen, I'll be back in a jiff, just…stay down here, alright? Don't go upstairs and see her till after I've talked to you. I don't want to come back and find that her head…well you know, you told me what would happen if she remembered…I'll be right back."

Before the Doctor could offer to go with him, or even go instead of him, Wilf was gone. He obeyed his friend's wish and sat down on the couch, where his thoughts of guilt and self-loathing, given the lack of social stimuli to keep them at bay, flooded to the forefront of his mind, as well as new ones revolving around the ailing redhead upstairs…

-

Wilf's neighbors, a pair of the most good-hearted newly weds he'd seen in decades, had been more than happy to give him a lift. They zipped over to the gas station across the street while he shuffled around the store, grabbing a few extra things while he was waiting for the prescription to be filled. His mind was a storm of different thoughts that he was trying to organize into coherent plans of action as to what was going to happen at his home once he returned.

Donna's husband had been killed in a car accident three years after their wedding. Beyond heartbroken, she had moved back in with her mother and him, and they had both comforted her and, eventually, she was a functional human being again, though at a cost. She refused to date again, and instead focused on working. One day, out of the blue, she blacked out at work. She woke up in the hospital hours later, in the middle of the first of many series of tests. She was poked, prodded, and everything in between while he and her mother sat in the waiting room, anxiously awaiting news. A CAT scan revealed the problem in unforgiving black and white: a tumor the size of a plum on her cerebellum. The doctors set her on aggressive chemotherapy straight away in the hopes that it would shrink the tumor enough that maybe, just maybe, they'd be able to operate. Donna had not lost her hair, but she had lost almost everything else: she had become skeletal from the vomiting, she needed help with the most trivial of tasks because she was so weak and exhausted, and her depression came back with a vengeance, especially after her mother had died in a mugging incident on the way home from the hospital shortly after Donna had been diagnosed.

It was up to Wilf to take care of his granddaughter, and he had done a marvelous job doing so for the past three years, especially considering his age. But to no avail: three months previous, her doctors had declared that she had only a few more months to live, and they would not be painless. The tumor had barely shrunk, and even though they had removed most of it a year ago, the bit that was still there had grown larger, stubbornly defying the following chemotherapy treatments. After the doctor's declaration of three months left of life, Donna asked to be allowed to live the remainder of her life in the comforts of her own home, away from machines and the sterility. Wilf seconded this request, and the doctors agreed. A nurse came in every day to help Wilf take care of her. Traciena, a curvy brunette of twenty-six, was a sweet and especially patient person, as Donna could be rather cantankerous in her pain-riddled state. The pain in Donna's head was so fierce it practically struck her blind and deaf to everything around her, and it would last for hours on end. On an average day, she would maybe have a total of two hours of reprieve. She slept for most of the day and night, except on particularly bad days. Her condition was deteriorating fast.

So…what was he going to do when he got home? His hearing might be less trustworthy than it had been when he was younger, but he knew the Doctor had been in the area before he'd knocked on the door; there was no mistaking that sound of his ship for anything else he'd ever heard. He also knew that the TARDIS was more than it seemed, that it had a consciousness of it's own, and at one point that consciousness had been bonded with Donna's. Had it sensed her distress and sent him here? Should he take that as a sign that it was time for Donna to remember, and…let her go?

The thought of losing his beautiful granddaughter hurt worse than any bullet wound he'd received in war, worse than his broken hip, worse than his heart when he had his heart attack right after Donna's husband had been killed. He loved that little girl more than, he was slightly ashamed to admit, his own daughter. Donna was kind, compassionate, and funny, three things that her mother had conspicuously lacked and did not choose to try and attain. Donna had always treated him with respect, had always loved him, always spent time with him. He in turn had practically raised her. He had been her great defender whenever her mother started in on her about work or relationships or anything…

But the thought of her hurting for an unknown length of time hurt more. The thought of her deteriorating passed the point of being able to communicate with or recognize him, of her slowly and painfully wasting away, hurt more. But what hurt worst of all was knowing that she thought she had accomplished nothing in her life. She hadn't had a child, she hadn't been able to keep a husband, she had only been able to get temp jobs. To her current knowledge, she had not done anything of worth, therefore she was worthless. On this current path, she would die without being able to remember all the wonderful things that she accomplished with the Doctor, and how she was, truly, and to someone other than her grandfather, one of the most important women in all of creation.

The thought of being alone scared him more than he cared to admit, but, by the time he had gotten to the register to pay for the painkillers (that didn't really do much) and the little toiletries he had picked up while waiting, he had made the decision.

It was time for Donna to remember who she was, otherwise she would not rest in peace. She wanted her, for once in her life, even for a minute, to just be proud of the things she accomplished. She was his hero; it was time she knew the full extent as to why.

It was time to let her go.

"Doctor? You still here?"

"Yes, Wilf. Would you like me to help you with anything?"

"Nope, I'll put it all away later. Donna needs her medicine. Her nurse is out sick today, so it's just me and her tonight. Well, and you."

Wilf had just plopped the bags on the counter and turned around to grab a glass of water for Donna to take the painkillers went when he almost ran head long into the Doctor.

"Right…Wilf…tell me what's going on. What's wrong with Donna?"

Wilf considered him. He was younger than his previous self—was that how his people aged? Instead of wrinkles, their faces became smoother? But that didn't explain the enormous chin, longer brown and wavy hair, and—this struck Wilf as the most disturbing—practically invisible eyebrows. The eyes…that had been how he recognized him. Those were the only thing that betrayed the age. They were so old, had seen so much. They looked tired and Wilf could see flickers of dark thoughts behind those old, kind, brilliant eyes.

"Doctor…have you suffered a loss recently?"

The Doctor was taken aback. "Yes, how did you know?"

Wilf nodded. "Your eyes. I can see it in your eyes. It's the same sort of look everyone gets when they've lost someone. There's just…I don't know, there's a flicker of pain you can always see that's characteristic of suffering a loss. Who was it, if I may ask?"

The Doctor took a deep breath to keep himself composed. "Her name was Amelia Po—Williams. Amelia Williams. And his name was Rory Williams. "

"You pick up married couples? Well, didn't think you went that general way, but—"

"Oh no no no! it wasn't like that at all! Dirty old man, aren't you?" the Doctor added. "No, no, the were friends. Very dear friends. And my in-laws, but that's a rather complicated story for another time."

"Ah. I see. Well, I'm very sorry, Doctor. I can tell they mean a lot to you."

"You're stalling."

Wilf chuckled. "Good to know your people-reading skills haven't slipped. You're a magnificent man, Doctor. I hope you realize that, even though…wait, how long has it been since I've seen you? I mean, to you. How long has it been to you?"

"I'm about eleven-hundred years old. I was a little over nine hundred when I met you."

Wilf's mind reeled. "Blimey! It's only been about five or six years since I last saw you! Time travel for you."

"Wilf."

Wilf sighed; he had stalled long enough. That pain behind the Doctor's eyes was about to be added to, and he was not thrilled about it. He gestured towards the sitting room; his knees were throbbing and he didn't want to drop more weight on the other man's shoulders while standing.

The Doctor leaned back against the back of the sofa, mind reeling with the tale Wilf had weaved for him. So much suffering in such a short amount of time…

He had built a wall around her memories to keep her mind from burning so she could live out a full life and be happy. That was his intent. He thought he had been doing her a favor by eliminating her memories, but now…

His eyes flicked to the stairs that led to the second floor, and to the bedroom of one of his dearest friends. He yearned to go up there and comfort Donna, but he did not wish to risk making her remember. He could not endure watching her burn. He couldn't bear to endure the destruction of another companion.

"Doctor?"

He had been silent for about five minutes after Wilf had finished his story. He cleared his throat so he could speak past that ever present lump of emotion.

"Yes, Wilf, sorry," he said.

"Doctor…give her back her memories. Give her something, some feeling of self worth, before she dies."

"Wilf," the Doctor said, his voice hoarse with emotion, "if I do that, she'll die. Her brain will burn. And in her state, it'll be a quick burn, you won't have any time left with her."

"I know," Wilf replied, "but like you said; it'll be quick. She won't be in pain longer passed today. She won't waste away. And she'll die remembering everything, and before she burns, I hope she will at least be proud of what she did, of the wonderful kind of woman that she is. I am so proud, and it hurts to know that she isn't proud of herself, that she doesn't think she's worth anything. I want my girl to rest in peace and in pride, Doctor. Please. Do this for her. Do this for me. If you don't…she'll go to her grave feeling like nothing, and I'll go to mine not too long after feeling like I failed her because I couldn't convince her how important she was in this world."

Wilf watched earnestly as the Doctor put his face in his hands, and allowed the temporary darkness to help him think about what he was being asked to do.

Was this what his confounded TARDIS brought him here for? To aid the release of a tortured soul from its mortal shell? And not just any soul, but the soul of a very dear friend who he had tried very hard to save from this sort of demise.

"Alright, Wilf. I'll talk to her. If I get any sort of inkling that she wants to hang on...we'll see. I won't promise anything, except that I'll talk to her and get a feeling for where she's at."

At that moment, a moan was heard from upstairs. It was shortly followed by another, and then another, until—

"Grandad?"

The tired old man and the weary Time Lord met each other's eyes. Wilf silently headed for the stairs, the Doctor right behind him.

They reached the landing and turned to the left. As they continued to the end of the hall to the only open door at the end, the Doctor found himself forcing his feet forward, rather than backward.

At last, after what felt like millennia, they came to the bedroom of Donna Noble. While, by some odd little miracle, she had not lost her hair, it had lost all of its natural shine and body, and hung limply around her face and across her pillow. She took up maybe a third of the modest sized bed she laid in. You could barely tell her body lay underneath the blanket gently draped over her. Her eyes were shut tight, her face screwed up in agony. The Doctor felt his hearts break.

"Donna, darling, I've brought your medication. Traciena's sick, so it's just us for the rest of the day. I brought a visitor for you though," Wilf added. He left the Doctor standing in the hallway to tend to his granddaughter. The Doctor looked on as Wilf painstakingly helped his granddaughter take her medication and drink some water. Donna's facial expression had become tighter as she tried to subdue the cries of pain in front of the visitor she had not opened her eyes to see yet.

Pain. Pain was all she knew. Everything hurt, but her head…it was beyond anything she thought humans could stand. It was piercing, all encompassing, and there were times that it struck her blind and deaf, unable to process anything outside of the fiery agony in her skull. When her grandfather was in the room, she silently begged for death, begged for her not to wake up the next morning, but to sleep for the rest of eternity.

She felt her granddad ease her back to her original position on the bed and take her hand. He squeezed it, trying to give her some comfort while waiting in vain for the painkillers to do the job they had stopped doing months ago. She heard the shuffling of another pair of legs as they made their way closer to her. This visitor sat on the edge of her bed and took her other hand in both of his. She opened her eyes.

The man was one of the goofiest looking men she had ever seen. His hair was ridiculous, his chin was enormous, and maybe it was her failing vision, but she didn't see his eyebrows. There was something in the eyes, though, that was so very familiar…

"Who are you?" she asked. He flinched, if only slightly, at the sound of her voice, once so full of life and passion and wit, now reduced to something weak, hoarse, and slightly reedy.

He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it. He leaned in closer and took one hand away from hers and brushed it against her face. Instintcually, she leaned in to the warm, somehow familiar touch of this man.

"Oh Donna Noble. What am I going to do with you?" the Doctor asked, his voice no more than a hoarse whisper that more than hinted he was holding back an emotional display.

Donna's brain flicked into a slightly higher state of awareness; no one had called her by her maiden name for a few years. Not since before she'd gotten married. A wave of sadness over her prematurely ended marriage reared over her, ready to drop and drown her at the drop of a hat. She mentally tried to push it back, trying to focus on this familiar stranger.

"Sorry?" she asked.

The Doctor met her eyes, and the pain and despair that met him cut him deeply. He could not let her be in pain any longer. He may have failed all of his companions in one way or another, including her. He would not make that mistake again, not with Donna.

"Donna Noble, you wonderful woman, you," he said. Donna looked at him, very confused.

"I think you've got the wrong woman," she replied. The Doctor's grip on her hand tightened slightly.

"No. No I don't. This hand that I'm holding, and this lovely face that I have the privilege of beholding—they belong to the single most important woman in all of creation. She saved the universe many times over. She saved me from myself. She is bright and clever, funny, beautiful, and by far one of the most compassionate and kind people I have ever had the privilege to meet. You are a hero to so many. There are songs written about you and your triumphs and your wonderful heart…the Doctor Donna. You are a brilliant woman." He had emphasized "brilliant", hoping that would stir something.

Donna looked at him as if he were an alien from another…

And with that the memories came flooding back to her: the Ood, Pompei, her first wedding, the TARDIS, the two Doctors, Daleks, the diamond planet, and all the worlds she had seen, and all the things she had done. And in that moment, Donna Noble felt noble, proud to be herself for, indeed, she was important. She was worth something.

"Doctor, where are your eyebrows?" she asked. The face may have changed, but those eyes and the smile that spread across his face had not. He placed his hand on her temple to check how long until the burn wiped her away. Only moments. He put up a small barrier to give them just a few more minutes.

"There she is," he said. He bent forward and gently kissed her forehead. "My Doctor Donna. I'm so sorry your time has run out."

She squeezed his hand. "Thank you for giving me my memories back, Spaceman. I know what's coming. And I know what that's going to do to you. I love you, you dumbo. Don't forget that. And I'll give Amy and Rory your love as well."

He was briefly taken aback and was about to ask her, but then thought better of it.

She turned her head to her granddad. "Love you, granddad. You gonna be alright?"

"I expect the neighbors will come check up on me. Can't get them to leave me alone," Wilf replied, a tear streaming down his face. "But you know now, don't you? That you are wonderful and brave and clever and beautiful, right? You've always been my little hero."

"I know. You were always my hero too. Both of you," she said, turning back to the Doctor, "even if you were a bit of a moron half the time."

The Doctor chuckled, too overcome with emotion to speak. This is what he always tried to avoid with his companions: seeing them wither and die. And here he was, helping the process along. "Rest easy, dear one."

And then the burn reduced the barrier to cinders, ravaged her brain, and within a second, she was gone. The lines that had been made by a scrunched up expression of constant pain were instantly smoothed. There was a peacefull stillness in the room, enveloping both man and Time Lord.

The Doctor stood in front of the TARDIS.

"Please let me in," he asked, tears still streaming down his face. He had just left Wilf in the care of the neighbors, who promised they'd help the old man with funeral arrangements and the like. He had not allowed the emotion to show until now. It was worse than seeing the gravestone of Rory and Amy, for he had actually been there when Donna's life had been ended. He felt as if his chest would burst open, letting the remnants of his hearts spill out onto the earth below if the TARDIS would not allow him inside to escape, to run, to do what he was best at doing.

And yet she still would not budge.

In his overwhelming grief, a flicker of a memory made its way to the forefront of his mind. He stretched out his arm and snapped his fingers, just like he had done after his and Donna's escapades in the library so many years ago.

The doors flew open as if they were on springs. He stepped in, and with the familiar wheezing whirring, they were gone.


End file.
